The Odds Part 44

She led the way with light feet. Her exile from London during the season promised to be less deadly than she had antic.i.p.ated. Unmistakably she liked d.i.c.k's wild man.

They found Bertie in the little roselit saloon, and as he welcomed the stranger Culver drew Hilary aside. There was much mystery on his comical face.

"I'll tell you a secret," he murmured; "this fellow is a great chief in his own country, but he doesn't want anyone to know it. He's coming here to learn a little of our ways, and he's particularly interested in English women, so be nice to him."

"I thought you said he was a French Canadian," said Hilary.

"That's what he wants to appear," said Culver. "And, anyhow, he had a Yankee mother. I know that for a fact. He's quite civilised, you know.

You needn't be afraid of him."

"Afraid!" exclaimed Hilary.

Turning, she found the new-comer looking at her with brown eyes that were soft under the bushy brows.

"He can't be a red man," she said to herself. "He hasn't got the cheek-bones."

Leaving d.i.c.k to amuse himself, she smiled upon her other guest with winning graciousness and forthwith began the dainty task of initiating him into the ways of English women.

She was relieved to find that, notwithstanding his hairy appearance, he was, as d.i.c.k had a.s.sured her, quite civilised. As the meal proceeded she suddenly conceived an interest in Canada and the States, which had never before possessed her. She questioned him with growing eagerness, and he replied with a smile and always that half-reverent, half-shy courtliness that had first attracted her. Undoubtedly he was a pleasant companion. He clothed the information for which she asked in careful and picturesque language. He was ready at any moment to render any service, however slight, but his attentions were so un.o.btrusive that Hilary could not but accept them with pleasure. She maintained her pretty graciousness throughout dinner, anxious to set him at his ease.

"Englishmen are not half so nice," she said to herself, as she rose from the table. And she thought of the stubborn Viscount Merrivale as she said it.

There was a friendly regret at her departure written in the man's eyes as he opened the door for her, and with a sudden girlish impulse she paused.

"Why don't you come and smoke your cigar in the punt?" she said.

He glanced irresolutely over his shoulder at the other two men who were discussing some political problem with much absorption.

With a curious desire to have her way with him, the girl waited with a little laugh.

"Come!" she said softly. "You can't be interested in British politics."

He looked at her with his friendly, silent smile, and followed her out.

"Isn't it heavenly?" breathed Hilary, as she lay back on the velvet cushions and watched the man's strong figure bend to the punt-pole.

"I think it is Heaven, Miss St. Orme," he answered in a hushed voice.

The sun had scarcely set in a cloudless shimmer of rose, and, sailing up from the east, a full moon cast a rippling, silvery pathway upon the mysterious water.

The girl drew a long sigh of satisfaction, then laughed a little.

"What a shame to make you work after dinner!" she said.

She saw his smile in the moonlight.

"Do you call this work?" She seemed to hear a faint ring of amus.e.m.e.nt in the slowly-uttered question.

"You are very strong," she said almost involuntarily.

"Yes," he agreed quietly, and there suddenly ran a curious thrill through her--a feeling that she and he had once been kindred spirits together in another world.

She felt as if their intimacy had advanced by strides when she spoke again, and the sensation was one of a strange, quivering delight which the perfection of the June night seemed to wholly justify. Anyhow, it was not a moment for probing her inner self with searching questions. She turned a little and suffered her fingers to trail through the moonlit water.

"I wonder if you would tell me something?" she said almost diffidently.

"If it lies in my power," he answered courteously.

"You may think it rude," she suggested, with a most unusual attack of timidity. It had been her habit all her life to command rather than to request. But somehow the very courtesy with which this man treated her made her uncertain of herself.

"I shall not think anything so--impossible," he a.s.sured her gently, and again she saw his smile.

"Well," she said, looking up at him intently, "will you--please--let me into your secret? I promise I won't tell. But do tell me who you are!"

There followed a silence, during which the man leaned a little on his pole, gazing downwards while he kept the punt motionless. The water babbled round them with a tinkling murmur that was like the laughter of fairy voices. They had pa.s.sed beyond the region of house-boats and bungalows, and the night was very still.

At last the man spoke, and the girl gave a queer little motion of relief.

"I should like to tell you everything there is to know about me," he said in his careful, foreign English. "But--will you forgive me?--I do not feel myself able to do so--yet. Some day I will answer your question gladly--I hope some day soon--if you are kind enough to continue to extend to me your interest and your friendship."

He looked down into Hilary's uplifted face with a queer wistfulness that struck unexpectedly straight to her heart. She felt suddenly that this man's past contained something of loss and disappointment of which he could not lightly speak to a mere casual acquaintance.

With the quickness of impulse characteristic of her, she smiled sympathetic comprehension.

"And you won't even tell me your name?" she said.

He bent again to the pole, and she saw his teeth shine in the moonlight.

"I think my friend told you one of my names," he said.

"Oh, it's much too commonplace," she protested. "Quite half the men I know are called Jack."

And then for the first time she heard him laugh--a low, exultant laugh that sent the blood in a sudden rush to her cheeks.

"Shall we go back now?" she suggested, turning her face away.

He obeyed her instantly, and the punt began to glide back through the ripples.

No further word pa.s.sed between them till, as they neared the house-boat, the high, keen notes of a flute floated out upon the tender silence.

Hilary glanced up sharply, the moonlight on her face, and saw a group of men in a punt moored under the shadowy bank. One of them raised his hand and sent a ringing salutation across the water.

Hilary nodded and turned aside. There was annoyance on her face--the annoyance of one suddenly awakened from a dream of complete enjoyment.

Her companion asked no question. He was bending vigorously to his work.

But she seemed to consider some explanation to be due to him.

"That," she said, "is a man I know slightly. His name is Cosmo Fletcher."